


was that your voice or was that me

by grit



Series: Strength Tells Many Stories [4]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe, BAMF Haruno Sakura, Body Modification, Canon-Typical Violence, Dark, Dependency, Dubious Morality, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Haruno Sakura-centric, Puppeteers, Strong Haruno Sakura, Tragedy, Training, turning humans into weapons
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-25 02:15:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16187990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grit/pseuds/grit
Summary: Sasori takes Sakura on as an apprentice out of boredom and keeps her because she has potential and he is pragmatic to a fault.Spontaneity doesn't suit his plans though and Sakura has her own opinion on murder, so it goes about as well as you'd expect.





	was that your voice or was that me

**Author's Note:**

>   
> **Warnings** for this chapter include emotional manipulation, murder, violence and a blatant disregard of the timeline.

Sasori levels a dispassionate glare at his mission scroll. His new assignment is a simple stage-and-kill. Suna nin sometimes get missions to play both sides: protector and assassin. It’s all very economically efficient and sensible, and Sasori would approve if he didn't have to carry them out. Long escort missions through remote areas are most decidedly not to his tastes.

 

This is the fourth time this year he is assigned one, and on the inside Sasori is seething with anger, even going as far as to drop his Henge when he kills his targets.

 

Of course he could maintain it. He’s a puppet master, chakra control comes as easy as breathing to him. But he feels like wearing his own face for the massacres, much too invested in the feeling of blood on his skin when he loses control to allow barriers of any kind. It’s rage, it’s savage, it’s art so primitive that he’d never admit to liking it. 

 

Thinking of the Suna Elders drowning on their own blood instead of civilian doormats usually does the trick.

 

Sasori calmly tucks the scroll away and decides on rather unassuming brown hair and golden tinted skin, both a common sight for Wind Country. He makes himself a little taller and unseals a katana to carry at his waist. He is Itō Makoto, Special Jounin. Bland in every way that matters.

 

He joins his clients, his targets, with a polite mask on his face, but can't be bothered to pull off more than a tight-lipped smile. He falls into a slouching but silent step next to the camels at the tip of the caravan. The men up front seem happy enough to talk to an actual shinobi up close and in very little time he has figured out all weak spots to cover and exploit. Not that there are many dangers to take seriously, given his natural superiority over any of these people.

 

By night, Sasori's patience hangs by a thinner thread than his chakra strings. He hates slowing down to civilian speed, so he seriously questions Suna’s intentions behind assigning him these things. When one of the children steps up and shyly asks if he can teach her a ninja skill, he has to restrain himself from killing her on the spot. But the audacity of the question is refreshing and he lets himself be swayed. For entertainment, if nothing else.

 

Sasori wants to see if he can change this little girl to his liking within the next month. He compliments the offending pink mop she calls her hair and she flushes an ugly red. “I don’t like it,” the girl admits, trying to hide the way the cold affects her. “My parents even named me after it and everyone teases me about it in school.”

 

He hums, pleased with her sensibility. “What’s your name then?”

 

She nervously tucks her hair behind her ear. “It’s stupid. Sakura. Haruno Sakura,” she says, bowing slightly.

 

That _is_ an unfortunate name. He forces his stoic expression into a smile and waves her down to sit. “Well then, Sakura. I'll have to teach you what to show the others so they have no choice but to acknowledge your superiority.”

 

She edges closer to the fire he made and nods hopefully. If you ask him, it's a rather pitiful look on her.

 

The second day of their trip he has her trying to mold chakra. She’s stubbornly persistent but grows frustrated by the time the sun is too steep to advance and the merchant leader has them all set up camp to get some rest. Sakura flops down gracelessly in the sand next to him and he has to pin a scorpion to the ground so it doesn’t sting her. She screeches, frantically jumping to her feet, and hides behind him. Sasori rolls his eyes. _Civilians._

 

She carefully tiptoes around the dead animal. Slowly, she settles down next to it and folds her arms rigidly. “I thought traveling would be more exciting and less crawly things,” she admits and flinches when he tricks the fabric of her clothes into moving against her skin.

 

He almost slaps her. “It’s Wind Country. There are fewer animals here than elsewhere. You ought to get used to them if you want to be a kunoichi.”

 

Sakura grimaces and pulls her knees close to her chest. “It gets worse?”

 

“It does,” he confirms curtly.

 

“But Ino-chan always says that -”

 

He moves forward faster than she can see and covers her mouth with his hand. “Quiet,” he says firmly and lets go. 

 

Sakura looks at him sullenly. “But...”

 

His cold glare dares her to protest. She falls silent. He nods approvingly, curling his lips into a smirk. “Good. Now practice.”

 

* * *

 

On day seven she can make the leather patches he gave her stick to her skin. Intrigued, Sasori runs a few tests on her. He's reluctantly impressed when her chakra control turns out to be in the 98th percentile.

 

She beams at him proudly, practically bouncing off of the ground, the very desert coiling away from her cheerfulness.

 

This... changes things. 

 

He slows down and falls back to oversee the end of the caravan where people are less talkative. He weaves a well-known but well-guarded Suna water jutsu and pulls clean fluid from the ground into his pouch. 

 

Sasori has never had much interest in hypotheticals unless they pertained to poison formulas, but he's a genius in his own right. Creating and counteracting intricate concoctions has never been a far-fetched fantasy for him.

 

Sakura, however. She has the vague potential to make him stronger through dedicated support, so she's a possibility he grudgingly considers.

 

He sips his water and lets his eyes flicker towards the horizon. The screeching blue of the sky crashes violently against the merciless red sand, painting murder. 

 

Sasori has always been rigid in his approach. Unlike many of the people he interacts with he doesn't even like positive surprises because they imply he didn't hold all the cards to begin with. But for the sake of her prodigious level of chakra control, he might be willing to make an adjustment to his plans.

* * *

They come across an old ruin with a functioning well and the merchant leader gives her people the rest they need.

 

Sakura follows him around like a blind puppy when he patrols camp and he pretends that he doesn’t like the idea of that. On the other hand, with how many questions she asks, he has half a mind to run her ragged to make her shut up. Later, he promises himself while he makes her walk up and down the walls of one of the destroyed houses to increase her reserves.

 

Sasori watches her and plays around with chakra strings in his pockets. He needs a new approach. He tried making Sakura in his image by being subtle and politely distant, setting himself up as a role model. But she’s a whirlwind of emotions and morals and almost painfully good-natured. She even tried to hug him. _Twice._

 

Were he as good at conditioning as he is at developing obscure poisons and spinning skin over wood, he’d have her chopping off heads for him in no time.

 

He snaps his hands around the strings and cuts into his flesh. Maybe he has to break her first.

 

* * *

 

Pondering his options, Sasori decides on a simple and unconventional but hopefully effective approach. On the ninth day, he drugs one of the horses and steers Sakura’s uncle close to the animal while a clone of his provides a solid alibi at the other end of the camp.

 

The man dies violently under its hooves. The death is declared an accident, the animal killed and Sasori chews gleefully on its well-cooked meat at dinner. He has Sakura practice the flute so as to express her grief artistically and improve her dexterity. Otherwise, she might actually try to talk to him about her feelings.

 

Some of the civilians point at him behind his back and question his abilities. Too bad he's their only option were they to be targeted by bandits on this supposedly dangerous route. He scoffs. Sheep.

 

He backtracks. It’s obtuse, it’s ridiculous, but Sasori can work with this. Rumours can be powerful given the right edge. Sakura’s perception is all that matters.

 

At some point, he changes his appearance to match a woman from the sixth wagon and off-handedly suggests his own involvement in the accident to Sakura's aunt.

 

He watches events unfold as Sakura's expression hardens and she grows restless. She starts snapping at the civilians to shut up about things they don’t know anything about.

 

When she turns away from her hysterical and paranoid aunt on day fifteen, she sobs against his chest and tells him her tragic origin story. When she was six and her parents died she was pulled away from her home and her school, from Konoha and everything that mattered to her. The authorities delivered her into the care of her mother’s brother. He didn’t much care for her ninja ambitions.

 

Sasori leans back, satisfaction outweighing disdain, and pats her head.

 

“I want to get stronger. I will show them.” Sakura shivers, but her voice is all steel. “I will show them,” she repeats, and he can tell it's a promise.

 

“You will,” he says confidently. He'll make sure of that.

**Author's Note:**

> [my tumblr](https://grr-it.tumblr.com/)


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